Around The Region

ATA adds more flights from Indianapolis\nINDIANAPOLIS -- American Trans Air plans to add 20 weekly flights from Indianapolis beginning in June, including nonstop service to Los Angeles.\nThe expansion will boost weekly departures from Indianapolis by 18 percent, from 109 flights to 129 flights.\nJust two weeks ago, ATA restored the 20 percent of flights it had eliminated after the Sept. 11 attacks. The airline also has recalled 800 of 1,200 workers furloughed since the attacks.\nThe new flights include seven more flights each week to Orlando with continuing service to San Juan, Puerto Rico; seven new flights to Seattle via Chicago Midway Airport; and six nonstop flights to Los Angeles. Current flights to Los Angeles go through Chicago.\nATA, the nation's 10th-largest passenger carrier, focused on Los Angeles because it is the third-largest market, behind Orlando and Las Vegas, for travelers at Indianapolis International Airport, company officials said Friday.\nMore than half of ATA's flights now originate at Chicago Midway, where the airline operates six gates and plans to have more than twice that number by 2004.\nATA still maintains headquarters and a maintenance base in Indianapolis, but it is constructing a $110 million training and operations center in Chicago.\nMeanwhile, ATA's private charter club airline, Ambassadair, said Friday that bookings rose 19.5 percent during the first two months of this year, when it added 900 members.\nMiss District of Columbia is crowned Miss USA\nGARY -- Shauntay Hinton, a broadcast communications major at Howard University, was crowned Miss USA on Friday night, becoming the first winner from the District of Columbia in 38 years.\nHinton, 23, began crying and her knees buckled when she realized she had won after it was announced that Miss Kansas, Lindsay Douglas, was the first runner-up.\nLast year's winner, former Miss Texas Kandace Krueger, quickly placed the winner's sash and crown on Hinton, who walked down the catwalk, then returned to the stage and was besieged by the other contestants.\nThe 5-foot-7 Hinton, who is black, is only the second Miss District of Columbia to win the Miss USA pageant in its 50-year history. She is majoring in broadcast communications at Howard University and minoring in business administration.\nHinton will compete in the Miss Universe Pageant in May in Puerto Rico.